


Crowley went down to Georgia

by Valvopus



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Demon Deals, Pre-Canon, Pre-Relationship, Thwarting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-03
Updated: 2020-04-03
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:53:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23460526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valvopus/pseuds/Valvopus
Summary: Crowley is enjoying his new scheme to get human souls for hell. It involves humans with poor judgement and playing the fiddle.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 17





	Crowley went down to Georgia

Johnny didn’t intend to spend quite so long tuning. For a start whatever demon had challenged him seemed very bored. There was every chance it would just kill him and be done with it. His eyes tracked back to the gold fiddle that was resting on the tree stump the demon had appeared on. Said demon was sauntering around, clearly waiting for Johnny to be ready to play. He didn’t even know why he had agreed to the wager, it wasn’t as thought he could blame it on a night of heavy drinking.[1] Sure, Tom had backed him up, wasn’t like he was facing a devil on his own, but it was his soul they were playing for not a drink or nothing like that. Not that he’d known it was a demon of course, he thought the man with hair too red and eyes hidden behind too dark glasses was just another soul passing through. He hadn’t signed his name anything like that, but he suspected that mattered less than people had been told. He was so stupid. He’d even missed church the previous week- too busy drinking the night before. All the talk of the forces of Satan, no one had mentioned how fast they came for you when you strayed from the path.[2] Sweet Lord he had messed up, no way back from this.

The demon idly plucked at the strings on his fiddle, he hadn’t even tuned it as far as Johnny could tell. Yellow snake eyes glared at the instrument and the tuning pegs began to rotate themselves followed by the fine tuners. After a few seconds the plucking repeated, it was perfectly tuned. Johnny and Tom shared a look. Sure, Johnny new a lot of songs, was damn good at a few of them, but nothing special, not really.

“Alright Johnny?” Tom didn’t look his way as he whispered it. His eyes were fixed on the creature of Hell, it had pulled a bottle of wine from some unknown place and was drinking it from the bottle. He wasn’t sure why Tom had come along, it made Johnny feel even worse. If he failed, then would the demon take Tom’s soul too? He hadn’t agreed to those terms, but Johnny didn’t know if the demon even had to stick to the rules.

“Yeah, best there’s ever been remember?” The words almost choked him on the way out. Dear Lord, the arrogant hubris would be the end for him. There was no reply from Tom. Clearly tinking the same as Johnny. Whatever pit this creature had crawled out of, there was no chance it hadn’t picked up the instrument along the way. What Johnny needed was a miracle, preferably one that could play the fiddle.

“Can we get this over with? I didn’t think it would take all day.” The demon had stopped drinking and was just stood at a peculiar angle watching Johnny. He took a breath and nodded, no way out of it now. The demon picked up his bow with a sinister grin. A burst of flames shot from his hand as a block of resin appeared. Johnny dropped his fiddle and stepped back. That earnt him a sigh as the demon pinch his nose in exasperation. “Guess I’m starting then.” The demon picked up his fiddle and pulled the bow experimentally across the strings.

“Really, Crowley?” The devil seemed to startle slightly then looked behind Johnny,

“Angel! Didn’t know you were round here.” The man that had approach could only have been an angel. A short fluff of blonde almost white hair, a pleasant smile, and knew a fiddle playing demon by name. He didn’t even seem uncomfortable in the afternoon heat dressed as he was in a fancy suit.

“Just passing. What foul deed am I thwarting today?” The words sounded amused, clearly the angel would put an end to the proceedings and the demon, Crowley, would be sent back to Hell where it belonged. He found it funny that the demon would even try to steal souls. The demon smiled excitedly at the Angel,

“You’ll like this one Angel. I bet this idiot’s soul that I can play better than him. If he wins, he gets this. It’s gold and everything.” The demon was almost laughing by the time he finished, it raised its eyebrows at the angel.

“You can’t tempt them into betting their souls Crowley.” Crowley looked entirely unconcerned as he rolled his eyes and continued to smile. Johnny wasn’t sure if the demon had been tempting him, maybe that was why he had agreed. That’s what he could tell folk anyway.

“I know that. Look, it’s a two-point strategy. I tell them they’re bound for Hell, nothing they can do about it, soul is mine whatever. Then they stop caring about being a good person, start drinking, fighting, you know the usual bad stuff and Hell gets their soul anyway. Got a lot of nods downstairs for this one.” The angel looked unimpressed at Crowley’s explanation.

“You wanted to learn to play the violin.”

“Dagon asked why I had been visiting a few of our musical residents.”

“So, you made up this hare-brained scheme to pretend you hadn’t just been slacking off for the last few years.” The demon looked mildly embarrassed for a few seconds.

“Point is, the point isss, it’s very demonic and evil.” The angel smiled patiently at the devil, clearly used to the foul creatures scheming.

“I’m sure it is, my dear,”

“Uh excuse me mister angel,” The demon and angel both looked surprised at Tom’s interruption, it was almost as though they forgot he and Johnny were there.[3] Johnny wished that continued to be the case. “Aren’t you going to smite him or nothing?” Crowley burst out laughing again, there was an odd tone to it, almost a hiss.

“Smite him?” the angel looked confused, “Why? Oh, of course. I’ll do that later; he owes me a drink.”[4]

“Right, let’s finish up here and then you can tell me what I’m tempting you to this time.” Crowley lifted the fiddle clearly about to start playing.

“Honestly Crowley, you can’t make them play now.”

“But,” there was a pleading look to the demon’s expression, “Uh fine. Here’s the stupid violin,” Johnny quickly juggled his own instrument with the one that had been thrust carelessly into his arms. The demon put the dark glasses back on, hiding the evil that was clear in his eyes.

“Wait, so I’m not going to go to Hell or anything?” The demon looked Johnny over for a few seconds, the feeling of being examined filled him. Memories of the first time he got so dunk he blacked out and then to apologise to his parents filled him. The judgement, the knowledge that no matter what he said there was nothing that would make the situation better.

“Eh, no you’re fine. So far. And you,” Crowley said as he turned towards Tom, “well avoid dying until you’ve sorted your life out. Or don’t. I don’t care really, just more paperwork.”

“Crowley!”

“What? Oh come on Aziraphale, it’s not like they’re going to say anything.”

[1] Although there were many of those.

[2] This train of thoughts incorrectly assumes that the forces of Satan are punctual, which they aren’t.* Any meeting was more likely due to chance than individually targeting people who missed a church sermon on whether Dogs get into Heaven and have souls.**

*Mostly due to poor organisational skills rather than any deep seated principle.

** They absolutely do.

[3] They had.

[4] Between Crowley and Aziraphale they had built a system over the centuries that meant that one always owed the other a drink. This allowed them to spend entire days getting drunk on the pretence of paying each other back. It had been a fantastic success when they initially started it, so much so that neither could remember who actually owed the other a drink.

**Author's Note:**

> I had this idea months ago at a gig, and yes I did listen to the song on repeat while writing this.
> 
> Mraowface: please stop sending me those messages.


End file.
